The Christian concept of God does not allow for a monologue. God is a dialogue. This thought becomes more clear as we read scripture. The two other Abrahamic religions – Judaism and Islam – depict God as being in dialogue with the creation. The Bible describes this as well. Which is one reason it is difficult to wrap our heads around the idea.
We Monologue As Dialogue
Catch me talking to myself, and I may claim it is the only intelligent conversation I can find. But I never really talk to myself. In my mind I create another self with whom I speak. It is indeed a conversation. This other self is not the same being as I perceive myself to be. I suspect other people do the same thing.
We “think out loud” to people other than ourselves often. Plato, Galileo, and David Hume used dialogue as the method for communicating their thoughts. Each person in the dialogues of Galileo and Hume is a fictional character (even though the Pope likely saw himself in Galileo’s Simplicio). Plato used historic figures as characters in his dialogues.
Creation and Conversation
I said above that God is often depicted in the Scriptures as being in conversation with Creation. The dialogic divinity of Christian tradition – Creator, Word, Spirit – do not require any creation for another with whom to speak. Yet, when the Word becomes the Son, humanity, and thus Creation is involved in the divine dialogue.
This has always been a problem for the doctrine of the Incarnation in the light of traditional theism. Prior to the incarnation was God incomplete? Or has God somehow become incomplete in taking on the incomplete Creation? The logical problem persists and is one reason many claim Jesus is not divine.
Dialogue Changes
When I add dry pasta to boiling water the water ceases to boil momentarily until the pasta becomes the same temperature as the water. The boiling proceeds like it never stopped. The difference now is the work the water has begun in softening the pasta.
Dialogue brings about a similar change in people. Adding the humanity of the Son does not change the divinity. It does change humanity bringing us into a different condition. St. Paul’s claim the Holy Spirit has been poured into us indicates a change taking place.
Dialogue makes human beings what we are. When dialogue ends, wisdom is lost. It can be rediscovered when a new dialogue begins between people. This was the process of all renaissances. Dialogue restores and/or reforms. It is the reason we claim the image of God that we have becomes the image of Christ.
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